Love & Haterade

When There's No Such Thing As NonFiction

When I remember the playground at my elementary school, it was more like an amusement park.  Slopes were mountains, skies azure blue and delicate breezes carried giggles for great distances, rustling the ruffled borders of my cotton frocks as I dangled from cool, gleaming steel and dropped into wood chips so soft they could cushion any fall.

Even though they didn't really.

When I remember my parents' house, it was more like a safe haven where bad things could never find you.  The worn furniture creaked hello, friendly crumbs snared in pills and fuzz,  smells so divinely comforting you could eat the air in heaping spoonfuls and my father's voice bellowing from all corners, intrusive and uncontrolled like his clumsy footsteps, chasing away the demons that threatened paradise.

Even though he couldn't really.

And when I remember a night that left me glowing, it was more like the final twist before you finish a Rubik's Cube where you could actually hear the pieces of my life clicking into place.  Secrets were divulged, electricity crackled like fire on a candlewick and when I went to the bathroom I actually had to put my hand on my chest and catch my breath like they do in movies because I thought, in those short hours, I had met the someone I was supposed to meet.

Even though he wasn't really.

They say there's no such thing as fiction. But now they say there's no such thing as nonfiction. And I wonder where, lost between two starkly different literary worlds, those who dabble in caricature and color and creative punctuation are supposed to live their lives.

(Love&Haterade&)Notes From a (Good) Friday Afternoon

garnishing the cocktails of my mind

For your consideration: another curious collection of thoughts, reaction and observations that didn't make it into a full-length post this week. They're sort of like the people you've quietly crushed on and never confessed: sure, something sparked; sure, something lingered; sure, they still cross your mind [as they once crossed your path] from time to time, but you know in your heart of hearts that some things are better left fleeting, that anything more involved just wasn't meant to be.

-If my favorite image of the week was this, my favorite video of the week was surely this: At first it doesn't look so bad. Then you start thinking, "This is a really long zoom." Then you start thinking, "Dude, when is this camera going to stop zooming out?". And then, if you haven't dissolved into a fit of giggles, "What the fuck?! Is this a joke?" Though, the bug in the corner reminds you: C-SPAN rarely jokes and always comes to play.

-[True Confession] I cannot, for the life of me, understand debates over stadiums and casinos. I've tried. Hard. But when people start talking about either, there's a part of me that just shuts down. Ultimately, I find them to be a little bit like logarithms, where I'll never understand their genesis or reasoning or argument but mostly, I'll never want to.

-[Though, I did love this sentence pair: This, in short, is our rink of dreams. If we build it, they should come.]

-Everyone wants to talk Sanjaya.  Everyone.  Unfortunately for all those people -- including the guy I've never seen in my life who rode three extra floors with me in an elevator at work to have the conversation  -- I've never watched a single episode of a single season of American Idol.  It's, like, the one reality show on television I refuse to commit to. [Something that, in and of itself, speaks volumes considering I watched All Aboard! Rosie's Family Cruise 15 times last year on HBO. And I would have kept going if Katie hadn't called an intervention. And still, I watched it again once last week.] TheGuyI'veNeverSeenInMyLife told me some ridiculous conspiracy theory that call center workers are calling in votes for MrMohawk. I'm here to say: it's not happening.  As Indians, we engage in schadenfreude in a way that I almost can't explain in words. And we're known to eye with evil. Especially when it's one of our own.

-I've mentioned before that I hate pets. And I do hate pets, dogs and cats specifically. I hate how their owners kiss them and treat them like people and then wonder why a four-legged creature covered in fur and native to the wilderness ate their kid's arm. I hate pet funerals, pet outfits and when animals talk in movies. I hate Barbaro and Montecore and Tinkerbell, and I hate every single one of the animals stuck on the roof of a house that got a split second of air time during Hurricane Katrina.  This week my rage went to a new place and I hated the 16 dogs that got so much attention post-PetFoodGate 2007. Especially when, by contrast, as of this writing, we've lost 3266 Americans in Iraq. That's all I'm saying.

-[SeeingEyeDogs are the exception to the above.]

-Sometimes I think America is like a 27-year-old woman. She chose, seven years ago, the guy who looked good in hats, who had a lot of swag, who was fun to go to bars with, but who ultimately became the guy whose decisions broke her heart three thousand times over.  She wonders now what would have happened if she had chose that other guy, the boring guy, who talked about the unsexy things she didn't want to think about when she was 20, things like 'the future' and savings plans and renewable energy. She sighs. She knows, at that point, it was a gamble either way. She saw him the other night, the other guy, across a grand, glittering ballroom. He was wearing a tuxedo and someone else's ring and he'd gained some weight, but, when he touched her face, some of that old magic sizzled between them. She buried her face in his hand and they stared at each other, in a long glance that spoke volumes, for all the things that could have been. The irrational part of her wondered briefly if she should have fought harder for him; her more steadfast elements reminded her what's done is done, that everything happens for a reason, that all that matters now are the choices she makes for her future.

-And, to that end, America is, as Lester would say, "on the dating scene". She's got all these choices. Like, 22 freakin' choices. And she's looking for someone who is inherently good. And honest. Who wants to be with her for the long haul, for all the right reasons.

-I'll steal [once again] TWM's [once again] fair-haired muse and replace her with a choice of my own. And to that end TheMiddleAgedManCrush [not to be confused with TheOldManCrush (think: Lee Hamilton)] never disappoints.  Sure, they're nerdy and rumpled and have a sense of humor that makes you roll your eyes.  But, somewhere along the line, they made the intersection of Sensibility and Global Vision not just another good school district but the kind of place that makes you want to build a house, plant some trees and invest everything you have in tomorrow.

Purple Rain

It was a little jarring, yes, to see Prince standing on his symbol out of his Minneapolis compound...in the rain, in Miami, in the middle of a football game.

It didn't really seem like his target audience.

But, after Sunday night, part of me stayed a few extra days in 1985, six years old, eating Doritos and curled up on the carpet of my best friend Stephanie's wood-paneled rec room...lost in the storyline of a movie Sally wouldn't let me watch...scared of getting caught and excited about a hazy, romantic future where nothing ever went wrong and no one ever wanted to be your weekend lover, only to see you laughing and bathing in the colors of a perfect rainstorm.

Year in Review | Unfulfilled Desire and Reasons I Don't Do Student Life

When I first moved to DC at the beginning of the year -- in an effort to both get my bearings and save money -- I worked as an RA for one of the universities that has a satellite campus in the area in exchange for free housing.  While I'm forever indebted to the university for extending me the opportunity, it sort of goes without saying that being 26 and dorm life don't exactly go hand in hand.

The building had unbelievable restrictions about overnight guests.  On one hand, it could be argued that the restrictions were protective safeguards.  On the other, they were truly outrageous: forms needed to be filled out at least 24 hours in advanced, signed by all your suite-mates, then approved by the building.  Within that there were a whole litany of other rules that were guest-specific with regards to duration of stay and frequency of visits.  I almost felt bad for the kids because it made an outside random hookup absolutely impossible.  I'll go as far as to say that the building itself was perhaps the greatest cock block of all time.

On a random Tuesday night, I was the RA on duty and the guard calls me at 1:30am to summon me down to the front desk because one of the residents (Katrina) brought home some guy (Michael Fink) who did not have overnight permissions and was to have left the building by 1am but hadn't.

(As an aside, Michael Fink is the greatest antagonist name for this story. Ever.)

I'm irritated.  I have to wake up in the morning. And I don't need any reminders -- especially at 1am -- of how charmed it is to be in college again.  Moreover, I really don't care who stays over in the building but at this point I'm so furious for having been roused from deep sleep that I've decided there's no way I'm letting anyone do anything.  (My mom says this is a good indication of what kind of parent I'll be.)

Michael Fink wanders down the stairs smelling like someone doused him with a bottle of rubbing alcohol and then hosed him down with Vladamir.  Hilarity ensues:

TheBarmaid: Fink?

Fink: (rubbing eyes) Yeah?

TheBarmaid: You can't spend the night.

Fink: Oh...ok.

TheBarmaid (concerned): You aren't driving, right?

Fink: Oh...no.

TheBarmaid: Ok, then you have to go.

Fink: Oh....word.

TheBarmaid: Word.

(Fink ambles to the door and stumbles out into the dark night.)

(Enter Katrina.)

TheBarmaid: Fink had to go.

Katrina: Oh....

Guard (who woke me up in the first place to boot Fink and at this point has no right to interject anything): Well, it's actually up to TheBarmaid if he stays or goes.  She CAN let him stay...

TheBarmaid: Um, no it's not up to me.  Getting permission to have someone send the night is like being released from Azkaban -- too much red tape.  And it's 1:30 in the morning.  And you woke me up.

Katrina (staring longingly towards the door): Oh...I just...hope he's ok.

TheBarmaid: Katrina? I assure you: he's ok.

Katrina (whose hair, if I haven't mentioned it, was totally JBF): Well, it's just that...

TheBarmaid: Katrina? Unless he's dying and sleeping with you was the antidote to that death, I assure you -- he's ok.

Katrina stares me down, partly wondering if I'm allowed to talk to her like that (which, I'll admit, I'm probably not), and partly narrowing her eyes and cursing me with a life of ever-lasting chastity. 

This is when a normal person would stop talking.  I continue.

TheBarmaid: I promise you, Katrina, in my 26 years on this earth, I've never seen anyone die as a result of unfulfilled desire.

And with that, Katrina fled the building and followed her Michael Fink into the dark night.